Quotes From Tuesday's Press Conference

Maryland Athletics

10-15-2013

Head Coach Randy Edsall

Opening Statement:

“Game number seven this week takes us down to Winston-Salem to play Wake Forest, a team that I have a tremendous amount of respect for. [Head coach] Jim Grobe is an outstanding football coach and person. We’ve got to make sure that we have a good week at preparation and have good focus. We need to listen to detail this week to give ourselves the opportunity to go down there and win. We look forward to the opportunity, but know that we’ve got a lot of work ahead of us to get done.”

On becoming bowl eligible with a win:

“It is no different than game one. We look at the season in its entirety. We don’t look at only five, seven, or two games. We look at each game separately and what we have our focus on is to get the win. If we get the win, we put it in the bank and let it draw interest. Hopefully at the end of the 12, we’ve put enough wins in the bank to achieve the goals that we’ve set for ourselves. That’s really our only focus. It is to go out and play better this week, get a win, and try to make sure we do everything we can to do that. It will be no different this week then it has been for all the other weeks so far. “

“When you take a look at the Wake Forest offense, those are the two guys that you’ve got to stop. Price is playing really well this year for them. He is throwing the ball extremely well. He’s also a threat when it comes to running the ball. He gets back there and he is elusive. They’ll run some zone-read with him, but also he’s a guy that has very good escape ability. So you’ve got to be disciplined in terms of your rush lanes. I’m very impressed with what he’s doing and how he’s playing.

“Michael Campanaro didn’t play against us last year because he was hurt. That guy is a playmaker for them. They always look to get him the ball in every situation that they can. He’s having an outstanding season so far this year. He has 44 catches already this year. He’s a guy that can beat you underneath with his speed, can beat you deep and is a good punt returner. I have a lot of respect for him and how he plays the game. I respect how competitive and talented that he is. He’s somebody that we have to be concerned with because he’s got the ability to make big plays for them.”

On points of emphasis in practice based off of the turnovers and penalties from Saturday:

“We only had one turnover on offense and that was a situation where we had a young man that wanted to make something happen instead of just playing the situation. If he just would have played the situation, that wouldn’t happen. Will [Likely] just has to understand the difference between fair catching and when you have time to just make the catch. The other one, I don’t know what you do. You’re running down and it’s a short kick. We’ve got to try to get down closer and make sure the ball isn’t getting away. I think we need to practice those things, but sometimes things happen. We’ve got to do a better job at just securing the football. I think one of the other issues is that we’ve got to get some turnovers. That’s the other thing we haven’t done in the last two ball games. We haven’t gotten many turnovers and we haven’t taken possessions away from the other team. That is something that we’ve got to do.

“As for the penalties, a lot of that is not using good technique and not being good fundamentally. Those are things that we will address and always like to address. We don’t like to do things that put us in a situation that puts us behind the chains or allows the team to gain field position on us. So we’ve got to have a little bit more attention to gain more detail, so we can focus on the little things. If we do that, then I think we’ll eliminate some of those costly penalties that we have had. That can eliminate the turnovers. We just have to be better in understanding situations so those things don’t occur in critical times.”

On linebacker Yannik Cudjoe-Virgil:

“It’s tough because you feel bad for anybody when they get an injury, a season-ending injury, but especially for a guy like Yannik. I mean that guy just works his tail off each and every day to be the best he can be and he gives great effort in the classroom, gives it in the weight room, gives it on the practice field and was playing well. You feel for him, you really do. But it’s one of those situations where in this game, there’s no guarantees that you’ll stay healthy for 12 games, you hope you do. That’ll hurt us. He was having a good year, but now what happens is other guys have to step up. Yannick Ngakoue, he’s got to step up to the level that Cudjoe was playing and that’s just the nature of the business. But like I said, I feel bad for him because he optimizes everything that I know I want to see in a football student- athlete here at Maryland.”

On linebacker Yannick Ngakoue’s readiness to assume a larger role in the defense:

“The good thing with Yannick, he came out of a very good program at Friendship Collegiate Academy and he understood the work ethic and he was strong when he got here. Again, the fundamentals and the techniques that we teach are a little bit different, which is always understandable and plus the complexity of how much meeting time and all those sorts of things. He came in prepared as well he could be prepared for the situation and then he’s learning. He’s still got a good learning curve to go, but the thing that I like is everyday he’s out there working hard and he’s getting better, and that’s all you can ask for.”

On the status of quarterback C.J. Brown:

“Last week, C.J. went through a whole battery of tests each day, which is the protocol that we have here for concussions. As long as you pass the one test then you move to the next one and that’s what he did. Part of the process was to put him out there and let him go through warm-ups [on Saturday] because that was still part of the process and he was cleared to go on Sunday. He practiced Sunday. He’s cleared; he’s the starter for us this week. He’ll practice full every day. He’s ready to go. One of the big things last week is C.J. probably thought he was ready to go, but again, he wasn’t cleared and he didn’t practice at all until he did some things later Friday and he did some individual on Saturday, did the things there pregame. He’s good to go, he’s cleared and he’s the starter.”

On linebacker L.A. Goree:

“I think L.A. is having a really good year for us. It’s great to see him get the recognition this week for his play a week ago. I think he’s really become more of a student of the game and understanding his role and how his role revolves within our defense, but again I’ve liked the progression he’s made in the last three years and I think he’s still going to get better. He’s a guy that really wants to do well, he’s not afraid of hard work, he’s physical. But again, I think the same thing; he’ll just continue to get better as he continues to hone his techniques and continues to get better from a fundamentals standpoint.”

Quarterback C.J. Brown

On if he felt healthy on Saturday:

“Yeah, I think I could have gone. I felt good early in the week, but they decided for the best. All the faith in the world in Caleb [Rowe] to go out there and get the win and now we’re moving on.”

On watching the game from the sidelines:

“It’s always tough, especially playing a rival, Virginia, for the last time. It was definitely a tough one to swallow, but I’m just glad we pulled it out in the end.”

On the possibility of becoming bowl eligible on Saturday:

“It would be huge, especially this early in the season. To go 6-1 and put yourself in a place you want to be at this point in the season, cross that off and every win after that is a better bowl; another opportunity to get better. It’s a big week for us to go down there and pull off a victory.”

Offensive lineman Sal Conaboy

On getting quarterback C.J. Brown back this week:

“C.J. obviously adds another dynamic to the offense. So having him back is big for us and brings us confidence.”

On the possibility of becoming bowl eligible on Saturday:

“Being bowl eligible, it’s a goal of ours and obviously something we want to do every year. To get this win for us we could cross it off the list and move on.”

Linebacker L.A. Goree

On his play this season:

“Being in the game for so long and being in the same defense for another year under the same coordinator was helpful a lot in diagnosing plays early.”

Getting back on track after the loss at Florida State:

“It was really huge because at that point a lot of teams would hold their head down and say that the season is over. We definitely held our heads high and came out with a tough victory.”

On becoming bowl eligible with a win this week:

“It would mean a lot, but we are not approaching this game different from any other game, it’s just the next game on the schedule. Being bowl eligible is a good thing to have, but this is just the next game.”

Defensive Lineman Andre Monroe

On making the move to the interior of the offensive line:

“The team needed me to make that move and I’m willing to do whatever the team needs for us to be successful, but honestly it doesn’t matter where I play, I just like to play football.”

On his play so far this season:

“I haven’t been as consistent as I want to be and that’s something I still need to work on. Obviously, everyone has something they need to work on and I feel like that’s something I need to stay true to, consistency.”

Defensive Lineman Zeke Riser

On how the team was able to win on Saturday:

“We played all four quarters, didn’t give up when we were down, not letting Virginia take the heart out of us. We kept pushing to the end and I think those guys persevering to the last second really got us the win.”

On preparing for Wake Forest:

“They’ll spread us out, they’re going to make us run sideline to sideline a lot, and they have a lot of good [offensive] players Their quarterback has been there for a while now; he can run so that’s always something we’re thinking about. Defense-wise we have to start with stopping the run.”

On creating more turnovers:

“That’s what this defense is based off of, getting turnovers, sacks, and tackles for loss, things of that nature. So if we are not doing that it’s hard for us to be competitive. We were negative three in the turnover game this past week and we still came out with the win; we can’t bank on that every week, we have to get turnovers.”

Linebacker Marcus Whitfield

On Wake Forest quarterback Tanner Price:

“He’s a great passer, he throws a lot of short passes, and he also can run the ball here and there so it’s definitely trying to contain him more than usual.”

On becoming bowl eligible with a win on Saturday:

“It’s definitely a concern on our list, but we’re not looking at that until after the season and looking where we stand with bowl eligibility. We are just taking this game as the next step.”

On the loss of linebacker Yannick Cudjoe-Virgil:

“I feel bad for Cudjoe getting hurt this past weekend. We are giving him all of our support; he is still stepping up as a leader showing us that he is still there with us. We want to go out there and get this win for him.”